HAPPY LANDINGS

The image below is a photo of the exhibit panel. Following it is a transcript of the panel.

Photo of the panel from the exhibit.

Land plants evolved many new features for successful life in a non-aquatic habitat.

Life out of water posed many new problems for plants: support and anchorage; reproduction in a dry environment; obtaining, retaining, and circulating water and nutrients.

Early land plant Cooksonia was among the first vascular plants; conducting tissues transported water and nutrients to all of its parts. More complex structures, such as true roots, evolved later.

vascular plants : land plants including ferns, cone-bearers, flowering plants, and extinct Cooksonia

New features:

  • conducting tissues , like a system of pipes, transport water, nutrients, and products of photosynthesis throughout the plant

When? 430 million years ago to present

PICTURE CAPTIONS:

  • spores (reproductive structures)
  • conducting tissues
  • Cooksonia caledonica
    A simple land plant with spore clusters at its branch tips.
    430 million years ago; Europe
  • Diagram showing common ancestry and evolution of mosses, Cooksonia , and ferns from organisms with waxy outer layer. Evolution of Cooksonia and ferns is where conducting tissue branches off.